It’s got to be something in the genetics.

While retracting Alex’s foreskin (oh, God the search terms) and bemoaning my fate of a life spent cleaning teeny penises (penii?), I noticed something that I can only attribute to his father’s side of the family.

He laughed.

Laughed.

Kept laughing.

Alex laughed the entire time I was cleaning the schmutz off of his penis.

I’m pretty sure this wasn’t covered in my copy of What To Expect When You’re Expecting.

So the one major drawback to this new diet I’m working on (aside from the suffocating farts, which is either a drawback or a blissful consequence, based on who you’re asking), is that the lack of sugar is making me exceptionally testy. I have never been the sort of person who guzzles sugar, and I’m usually happier eating some Kashi cereal for breakfast over some cinnamon rolls (no, honestly), I don’t care much for chocolate, and don’t liberally dump sugar into my morning (and afternoon) (okay, and evening…God, I have no secrets anymore.) coffee, so it’s been a shock that I am experiencing what I believe are withdrawal symptoms.

My friends who have done Atkins and South Beach have both mentioned this being a side effect during the first couple of weeks on the diet, but since what I’m doing is far less restrictive AND I have never been super into carbs, I had mistakenly thought that I was going to have no problems.

Ha, ha, ha.

I’m not in all out bitchtastic mode (yet), and I haven’t broken a box fan, deliberately stepped on an animal, or kicked a wall, but I’ve noticed that I have a marked propensity toward being snippy and cranky.

I’m sorry, preemptively, for anything I say that offends you. Unless I’m trying to offend you. Then I am not sorry.

With this out of the way, I need help, Internet. I need to know if my reaction to this is normal and how I should proceed.

A month ago, today, I ordered some prints from Etsy.com, which is what you recommended for some artwork, Internet (see, I listen to you!). And you were right. It’s a neat place and I love what I picked out.

According to the seller, she had some sort of glitch in her system, so I waited and waited and got nothing. Then I got something, but it was only part of my order. When I emailed her about it, she claimed that she’d accidentally sent me someone else’s order, but that she’d gotten it straightened out and I could keep my order, plus this other one (it’s a duplicate of what I’d ordered. Not terribly exciting.)

The last email I’d gotten from her was 6 days ago, when she claimed that she was sending my prints. From California. Not Tibet. And yet, in my mail today, aside from some ads, nada. Zip. Zilch.

But because I am testy, I have no idea how to proceed as I normally would. On the one hand, I’m annoyed because seriously, it’s been a month since my order. On the other, it’s not like these pictures are going to be the difference in whether I will live or die.

I know that Etsy (which makes me think of testy, which makes me think of balls, which makes me laugh) is pretty much a word of mouth place, and I don’t want to go and trash her there, but at the same time. Dude, it’s been a month. And I live in Chicago. Not somewhere exactly far from California (unless you are walking. Which pictures don’t do. I don’t think.) .

I’m being needy here, Internet, and I need YOU to help me muddle through what I am supposed to do next. So, if you were in my (bitchy) shoes, what would you do next (if anything)?

Many years ago, I had very few female friends, and with what I would call good reason. Teenage girls are mainly assholes in designer clothing, who would think nothing of stabbing you in the back and blowing your boyfriend in the bathroom between first and second period while smiling sweetly at your face. Once I realized this, life became much easier.

I fell into a group of guys who I still lovingly refer to as The Metal Heads ™, and spent most of my free time with them (Man, I miss free time). My social life then consisted of sneaking off campus to smoke and eat a dozen soft shell tacos, watching terrible slasher movies, and listening to Tool’s ‘Opiate’ on repeat.

The hormones eventually kicked in, and these guys decided to find themselves girlfriends, to alleviate the horniness known only to teenagers. This presented no problem to me in theory (like Communism) until I realized that the addition of women would lead to complications in our friendships. And not on my end.

These girls were either insecure because their parents didn’t love them enough, or because they sensed that I was somehow their competition. Which was not even remotely the case. Because I cannot go back in time to correct their perceptions of me, I am publicly declaring to The Internet At Large that I had no desire to sleep with these guys. I still don’t. And truth be told, had I wanted to do this, I would have. Teenage boys are not known for their discriminatory tastes, instead preferring to stick it in anything (preferably not a couch cushion or sock), so believe me when I tell you that if I had wanted them to stick it in me, they would have. Happily.

Thankfully for my STD count (or really, my Other Count. You know, the People You Have Slept With Count?), however, I did have discriminatory tastes. I also (in a fit of complete clarity that even I cannot believe I exhibited as a teen) realized that sex would, in fact, complicate matters of personal friendships, and in knowing this, made a vow to myself never to allow my horniness to cloud my judgment. I would never, ever sleep with a friend. Even if I were horny enough to think that dry humping a pillow was a good idea. Period.

In not knowing this about me, though, these girlfriends were overtaken by incredible jealousy, that can only be sprung out of insecurity. It didn’t matter even a little bit if I had a boyfriend of my own, all these girls could focus on is my relationship with their boyfriends. The icy stares, the delibrete snubs, the protective ways they would touch their boyfriends while I was around, it was all the new normal dynamic when they would bring their women around. After awhile I got used to it.

It didn’t seem to matter that although The Metal Heads ™ and I would routinely send each other those school sponsored singing telegrams or carnations, the attached note would read something like “You suck” or “Your vag smells like tuna” with the occasional “To the only guy I know who can fuck a cheerio without breaking it” thrown in for good measure. All they could feel was their own seething jealousy that I might have something with their boyfriend that they did not. And it was true, while they had a physical relationship with them, I had a dynamic that one can only achieve in really great relationships or a friendship.

Thankfully, I am still friends with these guys 10-12 years later (three of them were in my wedding party), and they have moved on to date women who possibly can understand that mockery and insults don’t mean that they are having The Sexin’ with me. Maybe it’s that I’m happily married now, and am obviously posing less of a threat to their relationship. Or maybe it’s because we’ve all grown up a bit, and (most of us) are more secure in ourselves than we had been before.

But man, I really miss free time.

Am I the only one this has happened to? I swear to you on all that is holy that I although I routinely mocked the size of these guys packages, I did it without ever knowing what they really looked like underneath their clothes. For all I knew (and know), they could have Ken Doll underwear for privates or been hermaphrodites. It never came up in conversation, honestly.

C’mon, make your Aunt Becky feel better about herself.

It may come as a shock to you that I have very few real-life mommy friends. The friends that I do have don’t have children, and the very few mommies I know live so far away, that between nap times and travel distances, play dates are more trouble than they’re worth.

The town that we live in is fairly affluent, which effectively means that the women who have children of comparable ages are much older. It’s not a problem for me as age don’t mean shit to me, motherfucker, but it puts a yawning chasm between our experiences. This, coupled with my penchant for being incredibly obnoxious (true story: this weekend I have decided that my favorite insult is “crotch”) has made the acquisition of new mommy friends exceedingly difficult.

A couple of weeks ago, having been suitably underwhelmed by the choices on daytime TV (paternity tests AGAIN on Maury?) and tired of staring at the walls in my house, I packed Alex up and trundled off to the nearby mall. We poked around aimlessly, stopping for lunch at McDonalds (Alex loves his cheeseburgers, which makes him 100% my child). While we sat in the food court, I was approached by a slightly older toddler girl and her father (who was obviously gay). The girl toddled over to me, and I greeted her with a “What’s up, dude?” when it dawned on me that I had the perfect solution smacking me upside the face.

I’ve always gotten along far better with men, in general, until I reached the age where all of my (male) friends got girlfriends who decided that I was very much a threat (I can assure you that I was not. Ever. A. Threat.), which, like it or not, eventually made hanging out a little more awkward. Befriending gay men got to be a better option, as I was clearly not a threat to their lovers (what with the Fish Taco), and being snarky and judgemental is a favorite past-time for me.

So, I thought to myself, who better to befriend than a guy with a kid? I imagined a future of bitchiness, snark, and hilarious discussions of our lovers privates and sexcapades (this would be more of a fanciful recollection for me). We’d have lunch! Dinner! Nap time imposed Happy Hours with fancy (and froofy) martinis! I went so far as to imagine that his name was “Nick” or possibly “Charlie.”

Tactically, however, I made several grave errors in judgment beforehand. First, and less importantly, I called his daughter “dude” or “man,” which was only because I am more accustomed to calling children this (seems more prudent than “princess” or “darling” considering I have two boys, eh?). Strike One. Becky: 0 for 1.

My second error, the one that nailed my coffin tightly shut was the fact that I had not bother to put on real pants when I left the house (I was wearing stained yoga pants. It was sexxy), as I had mistakenly assumed I would only run into mall-walkers on my journey. The final score was Becky: 0 for 2.

I talked to his daughter for awhile, she oogled the baby, and then we parted ways amicably enough (he did, I will tell you here and now, look me up and down disgustedly. I must have been very frumpy that day). As they walked away, like my frumpyness was catchy, I couldn’t help but feel a little sorry for myself for blowing the one shot I had at making a parental friend that I stood a chance of getting along with.

So explain to your Aunt Becky how (mostly) normal people do this. How does someone make new friends with kids? (or without. The kids are not part of the Requirements to Hang. Only being gainfully unemployed during the day is a prerequisite) Apparently, I’ve missed the memo that explained this in graphic detail, and I’m telling you, for my sanity, I NEED to have someone to talk to during the day besides Alex (at 9 months, he’s not much of a conversationalist.) and the UPS guy, who, I fear is learning to dread coming to my house to deliver packages.

It appears as though my era of a lactating female is drawing slowly to an end. Alex has decided that the quicker food dispersal system is not, in fact, garnered by my breast but by regular food stuff. To say that he is underwhelmed by taking a bottle (which would be the easiest way to use up the approximately 2,308 gallons of frozen breast milk I currently am storing in my freezer) is a gross understatement. He hates the bottle with an intense passion, which I cannot blame him for.

Despite my well-documented conflicting feelings on breast feeding in general (it’s more of a scientific oddity to me. You mean they do THAT? WEIRD!), I had assumed that I would feel more saddened by this inevitability than I am. After all, Alex has kicked my ass so thoroughly with his craptastic sleep patterns that I am not sure if I will ever be strong and/or brave (or stupid enough, really) enough to try and have another one, and three kids seems like a ton of kids (not to mention the fact that I would have to buy another car and grow a couple of extra arms). Even if I do have another one, I am not positive if I would breastfeed again (at least for as long as I have with Alex), as I’m underwhelmed by having to be tethered to a child all day, every day.

Please don’t send the Breastfeeding Mafia after me. I have no problems whatsoever with people who breastfeed for years. It’s just not who I am. And you know what? Being a parent is a lot of not being able to be who I am.

Seriously, if I were alone in the house, I can all but assure you that I would not watch either Elmo’s World on repeat OR PBS Kids all day. Nor would I opt to listen to Raffi, have to remove all swear words from my vocabulary, or take 30 second showers while feverishly praying that my children are not eating each other.

Am I bitching about making these personal sacrifices for my children? No, not at all. It comes with the territory of being a parent, and I am accustomed to it, and rarely get on the cross about it. But to me, breastfeeding is just another one of those things that strips me of all of my me-ness, and aside from doing it for the first couple of months, which is a sacrifice I would probably make again for the health benefits, I’m not sure I’d be willing to do it all over again.

Sure, there are health benefits to the mother (apparently) like losing those pesky baby pounds that I was just positive I was going to melt away along with my milk, but oops! psych! not so much. Hell, without eating supplemental junk food, I find it next to impossible to eat all of the extra calories that are required for my metabolism not to shut down.

Some people are overweight because they eat too much, but I am overweight (currently) because I didn’t eat enough. I HAVE A GLANDULAR PROBLEM, PEOPLE! (That always sends me into gales of laughter when I use this phrase. Maybe I should have shirts made that proclaim this. Then I’d be truly cool).

Until I stop breastfeeding, I have embarked on a new diet, one that doesn’t have me counting Points (but is still Weight Watchers), because I have no idea how many freaking calories I need anymore. It’s essentially a low fat, low sugar, low flour diet, and I’m finding it pretty easy to follow, thankfully. But it, of course, has one side effect that I’d never planned for: extreme flatulence.

That’s right, folks, I have now surpassed my husband, the former reigning King of All Farts, and have rightly claimed the Queen of The Rank Ass as my new title. Now I am the member of the family who can, in a single emission, clear an entire room with my suffocating farts. My new-found power is exhilarating, I am heady in my own strength, drunk on my own force…

Hey, where’d everyone go?

After much hemming and hawing, whining, pissing and moaning (and that’s just on my end) and several phone calls, it was decided.

Ben came home yesterday with his very own (rental) violin. It may not be the cello I was rooting for (because seriously, even after many years of not playing, I could still do it in my sleep), but he is more pleased with himself than I’ve ever seen him.

I suppose it’s fortunate, really, that I have such a background in stringed instruments, because I was able to help him muddle through some of his first assignments, while Daver, the maestro of the violin himself, was able to work somewhere that his eardrums remained intact, and not bleeding into the white carpet.

(Ass.)

Oh, don’t get me wrong, maybe I’m still wearing the Bitter Pants because I lost the battle of What Instrument Ben Plays, but I can’t help but wish he’d chosen something a little less, oh I don’t know HIGH PITCHED. A completely unexpected side effect of the squeaking of the the violin strings (E, A, D, G, for those luckily not in the know) is that the dog, who is normally firmly implanted on the couch (I am often able to forget that we have a dog at all, which was, not terribly shockingly, a qualification I had for getting a dog), sleeping through both day and night, only lumbering languidly off when someone goes into the kitchen to make food, howls relentlessly while it is played.

Without knowing it, he’s echoing my sentiments exactly.

It’s just too bad for the both of us, because like it or not, we’re going to have to get used to it.

I’m sitting, ass glued firmly to the couch cushions, television on for background noise purposes, baby happily babbling in his Exersaucer, and all of a sudden a female voice breaks into my thoughts:

“I have genital herpes” she confesses to me.

The camera pans to her partner, “and I don’t” he confidently informs us.

The commercial goes on to discuss more about these two shmoes goods than I ever cared to know while I sit there completely horrified, jaw gently grazing the cat-hair covered carpet. Why, oh why do I need to spend the rest of the afternoon trying to erase the image of herpatic-vessicle-covered vag-jay-jay’s from my already addled mind?

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that we need to pretend like STD’s don’t happen by shushing it up (Lord knows Aunt Becky has seen more STD’s than you have. Because I’m a NURSE, you pervert! Get your mind outta the gutter.) and shaming those who have them into institutions or anything, not at all. Hell, plenty of people have them, live with them, while others have managed to barely dodge that bullet, and I don’t honestly think that it’s something to be all that ashamed about.

I just don’t need my Oprah interrupted by having to hear about and subsequently imagine sores on your flipping meat curtains.

Before you flog me for being insensitive to those who have herpes, let me assure you I also don’t really care to have my day interrupted by ads promising to rid me of that pesky yeasty discharge, freshen up the old curtains with a vinegar douche, or make sure I don’t piss my pants in public anymore. For awhile, I wondered if advertisers had somehow read my mind BECAUSE THAT WAS EXACTLY WHAT I HAD BEEN SUFFERING FROM! ALL OF IT. AT ONCE!

*ahem*

I kid, I kid.

I’m not going to pretend I haven’t dealt with some delicate conditions of my privates over the years, hell, I’ve even gleefully documented When Monistat Attacks (my husband is a very, very lucky man), went to the hospital after I peed my pants, but none of these things have put me on your television set. Sure, I talk about these delicate conditions on my blog, but you have voluntarily chosen to read (or click away quickly. Whateves. Can’t say that I blame you) and I swear to you on all that is holy, I’ve not been endorsed by a soul, and make not even one cent for writing this. In fact, I’m almost certain there are people who would pay me to NOT blog any longer.

Alas, I digress.

But seriously, could we PLEASE put a ban on having to watch people talk about the state of their junk? Even as someone who frequently asks “When was your last bowel movement?” I don’t want to have to consider the rashes of random stranger’s privates (and believe me when I tell you that I have actually had strangers want to “show me their rash” when I tell them that I am a nurse. It happened once on the subway and I will never, ever forget it, no matter how many cocktails I’ve downed.).

So what bugs YOU when you see it advertised? Is it the Viagra commercials? Or perhaps you hate the commercials about people getting shmaltzy about their cats and it makes you want to break your TV set, because those are annoying, too (and I loves me my animals).

Or maybe your Aunt Becky is just in uber-prude mode (which might be the first time ever I would be accused of being a prude. Ooooh Yeahhhhh.), and shouldn’t be bothered by something as simple as an STD medication and should probably get the hell over herself already (this is likely. Very, very likely). In this case, just tell me something, anything that bugs you today.

Um…Wow, so I guess I got told by the Lovers Of Vincent D’Onofrio, didn’t I? Think of it this way, ladies, I am now less competition. I spent about 20 minutes scratching my head and trying to figure out how these people found me, until the realization that I a) must have spelled his name right b) google is a powerful search engine, smacked me right up the side of my face. I feel like I deserve a cookie or something for spelling something right, eh Manny?

Normally google searches (which is the only reason I have a stat counter installed, because the search terms crack my ass up) just lead people looking for “why does pregnancy suck” and “being pregnant asshole” with the occasional “vodka pregnancy” (and I have to say that confidential to those searchers who found me by typing in “mommy wants some sausage” and “dumbest bitch in bathroom remodel,” you are my new personal heros) to me, and I always wonder if they found what they were looking for.

I certainly hope that I don’t disappoint my random visitors.

(I am completely looking forward to the day that I have a blog troll, you know, the kind of person who hates me so viciously that he/she leaves me nasty comments telling me how much I suck donkey ass. I can’t say that I court controversy here on my blog as an unspoken rule, because I generally don’t talk about religion or politics, because any pathetic amount of keyword tapping on my part wouldn’t do justice to those people who write about these things for real, with evidence and research and smart people stuff. But when I have a troll, I will know that I am doing proper justice to a blog. Does that make me weird?)

—————–

You know the scene, you pull up to a stoplight and the car next to you has their windows down and some insanely ridiculous song is bumping loudly. If you’re a voyeur such as myself, you contort your body into neck-craning positions to determine who is listening to that awful music. And if you’re me, AND you’re lucky, you’ll find that it’s a hilarious study in contradictions: the 70 year old woman listening to NWA, the 18 year old wanna-be thug-a-lug listening to Yanni, the uptight-looking businessman listening to Britney. Then you spend the rest of your day gloating over someone looking dumber than you in a public setting (Yes, I am very, very mature).

This always makes me a bit shy to bump MY music too loudly for fear that someone next to ME at a stoplight will find my my musical selections uproariously funny. Some of the stuff in my disc changer is fairly standard for me: Justin Timberlake, The Ubiquitious Britney CD, Amy Winehouse, along with a rotating variety of far more shameful selections. I will boldly proclaim to you, Internet, two of the songs that I will play at top volume, BUT ONLY IF THE WINDOWS ARE ROLLED UP AND I HAPPEN TO BE (hahahaha!) ALONE IN THE CAR.

1) Elton John’s “The Way You Look Tonight”. It’s one of the all time sweetest love songs that I shamefully adore. The lyrics are adorably sweet and meaningful (so unlike myself), but the corn-ball factor is far too high for me to listen to without some shame. It’s one of those songs that I may have considered for our requisite First Dance but hadn’t made it’s acquaintance at the time in my life when I had to think about such stuff. Instead we danced to “What A Wonderful World,” which was decidedly not “The YMCA” that I had shamelessly petitioned for. Damn The Daver and his emo sensibilities!

(You cannot tell me that wouldn’t have been funny. And yes, thankyouverymuch, I HAVE seen that video of the newlyweds dancing to “Baby Got Back” which was an idea that was stolen from me, and vetoed by my husband. Why YES, I am wearing my Bitter Pants this morning! Do they make my butt look fat?)

2) Rod Stewart’s “Forever Young.” Now, the one arena in my whole life that I am marginally sappy about is my children, I admit it here and I am not ashamed of this. This song makes me feel all gooey inside (but in a good way) when I listen to it, but I am completely and utterly aware of how dumb it is, especially when you know how HIS kids turned out (*ahem, KIM STEWART, ahem*). I rock out to it, for sure, but I do it responsibly and while no one is watching me.

So tell your Aunt Becky what makes you turn up the volume WHILE rolling up the windows and checking to make sure no one who knows you can see you quietly rockin’ out to this lame song (s).

Dear Vincent D’Onofrio,

We’ve had a year together, and it’s been joyous, hasn’t it? I fell for you when the pregnancy hormones made me nearly impossible to deal with, and my husband learned that plugging me into the television ensured that I wouldn’t pick a fight with him over the ugly light fixtures in the kitchen or my copious toe hair.

I endured many criticisms over our love, darling Vincent, mainly from my friends who couldn’t possibly understand what I saw in a slightly chubby actor almost as old as my father. They showed me pictures of you as Sgt. Pyle (which was a terrible name. Did you know that the Brits call hemmorhoids “piles”? You should have negotiated for a better name when you took that role. I’m just saying.) and as the bug from Men In Black, and I let it roll off my back like so many drops of water into the ocean of our love (or something).

As an avid People reader, I was shocked to learn that not only are you married, but your wife is having a baby. YOU ARE HAVING A BABY WITHOUT ME, and I don’t appreciate that one teeny bit, Vincent. Sure, we’ve never actually “met” in the most literal sense of the word, but that shouldn’t have stopped you from pining for some anonymous (but fabulous) midwestern girl (with bonus kicky hair!), AND NOT KNOCKING SOME OTHER LADY UP!

I mourned our lost love for a couple of weeks, before I made the acquaintance of a new television boyfriend for whom I can pine, someone who is honest about his wife and child but is snarky enough that I can overlook this weeny little detail: Anthony Bourdain.

I can practically hear you laughing through the miles when I say this, because, as you well know, I am not a cook. Maybe I’m even an “anti-cook” as I’d imagine you’d say, with my favorite recipe being “shamelessly order takeout.” In fact, 99% of the things my new boyfriend eats with gusto, I wouldn’t touch with someone else’s mouth and stomach. You might even say to me, “Now Becky, you don’t even CARE about food,” and you would be correct, I don’t. But I do care very much that he can work the phrase “Oh, there’s a pube in my drink” into television. I care about that very much.

As you know, Vincent, “pube” and “moist” are two of my favorite unintentionally hilarious words, and to hear him use one of those appropriately made me swoon with love. For him. Not you. Because the best that you can give me is acting like more of a lunatic and forgetting to shave your face, WITHOUT using either of those words, the words that are (partially) the key to my heart (like hotdogs!).

I’m sorry, Vincent, but it’s over between us, and I hope that you’ll agree that it’s for the best.

With Love (but less than I have for my new boyfriend. A lot less.),

Becky

PS. I hope that your baby cries. A lot.

PPS. A quick internet search has led me to realize that many other people shared my love for you, and they make me feel quite gooshy (in a bad way) inside. They’re creepier than me, right?

PPPS. Hope that you’re not getting any sleep with that new baby.

—————-

So, who is YOUR most shameful crush? C’mon, I know I’m not the only person who has inappropriate crushes on weird celebrities.

Am I?

With the help of The Daver, I have now learned just how easy it is to put pictures up. It’s shamefully simple, and now I am ashamed of my ineptitude at all things electronic.

And I learned it all for YOU, Internet. Just for you. That’s how much your Aunt Becky loves you.

I present to you, without further Becky-Babble: Alex eats an Oreo:

(Does he look female to you? I don’t so much think so, but every single time, and I mean every single time, that we go out, someone always comments on what a (insert applicable adjective here) little girl we have. Doesn’t matter if he’s dressed head to toe in blue, people seem to think he looks feminine. Poor kid’s gonna get a complex. Especially when he learns that I put him in dresses as a baby (no, Daver, don’t worry, I don’t. Much.).)

And here is my hair, sadly without the frumptastical before picture:

But, dear Internet, you have no idea the beast that has been unleashed by my learning how to put pictures up here, no idea at all. Entries will now be peppered with gratuitous shots of such interesting slices ‘o’ life as “Wow, Lookit How Full of Crap Our Garage Is,” “Becky Eats Lunch (With Bonus Silverware!)” and “How Can Three Cats Excrete THAT Much Excrement?”

Ah, I take that all back, have no actual fear, I’m much too lazy to do that.

Mostly.

(cue evil laughter)